


tramps like us, baby

by mollivanders



Category: Lost
Genre: F/M, On the Run, Post-Series, Road Trips
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-05-27
Updated: 2010-05-27
Packaged: 2017-10-30 11:11:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 638
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/331134
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mollivanders/pseuds/mollivanders
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They try living like normal people, for a while. Kate and Sawyer have both tried this before, they know the steps and <i>supposed to</i>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	tramps like us, baby

**Author's Note:**

> **Title: tramps like us, baby**  
>  Rating: G  
> Characters: Sawyer/Kate  
> Spoilers/Warnings: Season 6 finale, "The End." Kinda.  
> Summary: For 's [Ficlet Challenge 2010](http://community.livejournal.com/lostsquee/665818.html). Prompts: 'drive' and 'analogy'  
> Disclaimer: LOST belongs to _ABC_ , I own nothing.

They try living like normal people, for a while. Kate and Sawyer have both tried this before, they know the steps and _supposed to_.

So she picks up groceries and he changes the car’s oil, but they always watch each other from the corner of their eyes, like they’re waiting for the other to break and make a run for it.

(Between taco night and movie night, he takes her out dancing. Never indoors, never to the same place, and only to hear the click of her shoes and watch her spin away and back again.)

They play house for eight months before she asks him, _Remember Clementine?_

His pasta-laden fork hangs forgotten as she stares him down. Truth be told, he’d forgotten (that was the plan). She drags him to meet his daughter on a play date with Aaron and he watches them fight in the sandbox, wonders how a little girl got to be so like him.

 _This isn’t us, is it?_ she whispers in his ear that night and he pushes the sheets back, pushes her shirt up and murmurs against her stomach, _Not for long, Freckles_. He counts on the shivers he still gives her.

 

It’s entirely unsurprising when she shows up at the police station and sits on the edge of his desk, winking at him from under her cap. _Let’s go for a drive, darling,_ she says and Sawyer tries not to laugh, ignores Miles’ warning jazz hands.

They’ll be back (someday).

She takes the keys and takes her cap, leans back in his seat as she starts driving. They don’t talk, don’t plan, just let things happen for once.

(On or off the island, they’re not going to wait for things to just fall apart.)

 

They make it 400 miles before the car gives out and Kate gives Sawyer a look that says ‘told you so’

Rental agencies are the easiest to con, it turns out, and Sawyer doesn’t think twice about handing fake documents to the fresh-faced kid at the counter. Kate does, later. Hindsight’s twenty-twenty.

 _What are we doing?_ she asks him one night while they drive through Nebraska. _I thought…_

 _That was the island_ , he answers. _We have to start over here._ He doesn’t say what they both know (start everything over).

 _Maybe I should turn myself in,_ she jokes and he swerves the truck off the road, crickets the only sound in the empty space between them and the world. _I’m not breaking you out of jail,_ he swears, more than that in his tone and she smiles. _You’d have to join me._

Everywhere they go, Kate’s a liar (lies to him, lies to herself).

 

When they hit the east coast she looks north and he looks south; they settle for taking a ship at random and end up on a cruise around Australia. Other couples point out the stars and gasp at the dolphins; Sawyer watches as Kate perches on the stern railing and swings her bare feet over the churning water below. Grips the railing on either side of her and intones a bar of a song ( _tramps like us, baby…_ ) 

These children's games will end them.

 _Dance with me?_ she asks after nearly two weeks of rocking on the waves, hiding from the crew officers, and exploring small coastal towns just long enough to lose their sea legs. She’s not even looking at him but through the porthole at the city disappearing behind them.

Sawyer takes her out on the deck and she spins in a slow circle, her narrow skirt swirling at her knees. He can’t look away (neither can she). _We were made to run,_ she affirms back at him, eyes serious and arched.

When the cruise ends, they stay on board. They’re not through yet (it’ll all come back around).

_Finis_


End file.
